Soldier, former soldier among those caught in DEA sting

By Jason Buch :
March 26, 2012
: Updated: March 30, 2012 2:31am

A South Carolina man was gunned down by federal agents Saturday in Laredo after a sting targeting U.S. soldiers who wanted to work for the Zetas drug cartel went wrong, federal prosecutors said.

Former Army 1st Lt. Kevin Corley, 29; Army Sgt. Samuel Walker, 28, both of Colorado Springs, Colo.; Shavar Davis, 29, of Denver; and Jerome Corley, of South Carolina, drove into Laredo Saturday armed with two semiautomatic rifles, a knife and a .300-caliber bolt-action rifle equipped with a scope and a bipod, according to a criminal complaint filed in federal court.

They were in Laredo, prosecutors allege, to raid a ranch where the men believed they would find 20 kilograms of cocaine that had been stolen from the Zetas.

Kevin Corley, who served in Afghanistan in 2010 and is Jerome's cousin, had been so gung-ho about his assignment that he planned to use his knife to carve a Z, the Mexican cartel's calling card, into his victim's chest, according to the complaint.

But something went wrong when the four men went to meet with the traffickers at about 12:30 p.m. Saturday at a warehouse on Laredo's northwest side. The “Zetas,” actually undercover DEA agents, moved away, according to the complaint. Armed federal agents moved in. In the ensuing confrontation, an agent shot and killed Jerome Corley.

The circumstances surrounding Corley's killing remain unclear. The DEA, FBI and U.S. Attorney's Office said they couldn't comment beyond the criminal complaint. The complaint doesn't say if Jerome Corley was armed, only that agents found weapons in the van the men drove to Laredo.

“He's a great guy,” she said. “I don't understand how this happened. It's taken me by surprise.”

The two met in 2010, after he'd served in Afghanistan, she said. He rarely talked about that. He enjoys playing pool, Young said, and had played football as a young man. She described him as “easy going and drama free.”

Young had met Jerome Corley, she said, but didn't know him well.

As it turned out, the Corleys had never met with any members of the Zetas. They'd been the targets of a DEA sting more than a year in the making, using wiretaps and undercover agents.

The sting began in January 2011, when accused drug trafficker Marcus Mickle, 20, of South Carolina, negotiated to buy marijuana from undercover DEA agents he thought were Zetas, the complaint alleges.

In September, Calvin Epps, 26, also of South Carolina, and Mickle put agents on the phone with Kevin Corley, then still in Army.

“Kevin Corley offered to provide tactical training for cartel members, including approaches, room clearing, security and convoy security,” the complaint reads. “Corley also offered to purchase weapons for the cartel under his name as long as he could destroy the serial numbers.”

By January, Corley had sold the agents Army training manuals and military equipment, including an armored vest, according to the complaint. But things escalated that month, prosecutors allege, when the agents asked Corley to participate in what the complaint described as a murder-for-hire scheme.

“The agents inquired about Kevin Corley's earlier assertion of his ability to perform ‘wet work,' specifically whether he could provide a team to raid a ranch where 20 kilograms of stolen cocaine were being kept by rival cartel members,” the complaint reads. “Corley confirmed that he would conduct the contract killing with a small team” consisting of his cousin Jerome Corley and Walker, the Army sergeant.

Meanwhile, prosecutors allege, the Corleys, Mickle and Epps were involved in marijuana smuggling.

On Jan. 14, police in La Salle County stopped a marijuana-laden tractor-trailer while the four men escorted it in another vehicle. In March, according to the complaint, Kevin Corley sold an undercover agent two AR-15 assault rifles, a training rifle, armored vests and other military equipment, according to the complaint. He was discharged from the Army on March 13. When the alleged hit team arrived Saturday in Laredo, a grand jury had already indicted the Corleys, Mickle and Epps for drug trafficking.

After the shooting at the warehouse, federal agents filed drug and weapons charges against Kevin Corley, Davis, and Walker. In an interview at DEA offices in Laredo, Davis said he was the driver and Walker said he was supposed to use the bolt-action rifle to cover the team's assault on the ranch, according to the complaint. Corley, the complaint alleges, said he planned to forego the $50,000 the “Zetas” were planning to pay him for the raid and skip town with the 20 kilograms of cocaine.

Corley, Davis and Walker are scheduled for a detention hearing Thursday.

Only one of the men caught in a DEA sting in Laredo on Saturday was a former soldier, and another still was in the military. A headline on Tuesday's page A1 of the Express-News and on mySA.com misstated the number of former soldiers involved.